Thursday, September 21, 2006

Feel-Good Time!

Hey, is that a naked lady around that corner? Oh... no. No, it isn't.

Just as there are failed states like Haiti and Somalia, so, too, are there failed towns.Sandy Bay is one such place, and while the dead bodies of American marines aren’t being dragged through its streets, any sane person would feel ill at ease while spending so much as five minutes here.

As soon as you drive into town after spending two hours on one of the worst, most depressing roads known to man, a thought hits you: I’ve made a terrible mistake.Don’t let the satellite dishes fool you, my friend; below them sit some of the most dilapidated houses and squalid living conditions you will ever see this side of Calcutta.

No, Mother Theresa never had it this bad: green water that intermittently shuts off; children who roam the streets in packs at night, long after you’ve gone to bed; buckets of paint thrown on cars, covering the smashed windshields beneath.I’d speak of the view, but with my barred windows covered at all hours behind pinned-down blinds, there isn’t much I could describe.Yes, it’s just about as close as you can get to hell on earth, and you have now committed yourself to living here for another nine months.

You can’t blame the locals for the conditions in which they live.Not entirely, anyway.Basically, we fucked them over about as much as you can fuck a people over just short of outright genocide, and this is where they find themselves a few hundred years later.So, thanks a lot, great-great-great-great grandpa, you fucking cunt scab.You abhorrent piece of feces.I hate you.